Sulaimaniyah : Iranian troops have
crossed into Iraq twice in three days amid clashes with
Kurdish rebels in the Qandil mountains near the border, a
security spokesman said Saturday.

The incursions, which both occurred after Iran`s
ambassador to Baghdad was summoned to the foreign ministry
over the issue, came during a series of clashes in recent days
with the Party of Free Life of Kurdistan (PJAK).

"Iranian forces, two days ago (Thursday), entered...
Iraqi territory in the Haji Omran area" in Iraq`s Kurdish
autonomous region, a spokesman for the region`s peshmerga
former rebel security force told a news agency.

"The Iranian soldiers numbered more than 30, and were
combined with armoured vehicles and heavy weaponry," Major
General Jabbar Yawar said.

Yawar said the Iranian troops penetrated two kilometres
(just over a mile) into Iraqi territory, two days after they
crossed three kilometres (two miles) over the border in
similar clashes with the PJAK.

In recent weeks, Iran has repeatedly shelled suspected
PJAK rear-bases in the border area. It has also carried out
helicopter assaults across the frontier.

In a statement on May 31, the foreign ministry said it
had separately summoned the ambassadors of Iran and Turkey
over cross-border attacks by Tehran and Ankara against Kurdish
rebel movements.